‘The only thing we have left.’ Charlotte’s first park for Black people gets a makeover.
John Pettis played games at Pearl Street Park as a kid growing up in the 1950s in Charlotte’s Brooklyn neighborhood.
Directly south of uptown, he’d meet his friends there after school and bat softballs or throw horseshoes. But as the longtime Charlottean grew up, he watched his community get demolished and his childhood park no longer had many visitors.
Now, after three years of construction, Charlotte’s first public park for Black residents has reopened —with a range of amenities and a nod to its history.
History of Pearl Park
Large retail and housing developments, including the Metropolitan, Midtown Terraces and East Morehead Apartments, surround the historic 11-acre park south of uptown.
The city planned the park for the former Brooklyn community, Charlotte’s largest Black neighborhood at the time, and bought the land from Thompson Orphanage on March 31, 1943, local historian Tom Hanchett said in a 2018 presentation to Mecklenburg officials.
The first official use of the park, which was built during World War II, was for “Victory Gardens,” individual garden plots for residents, according to Hanchett’s research. “Victory” referred to the Allies’ winning World War II.
The park, which also served the Second Ward neighborhood, “was like a big family gathering every day,” Frank Manago, a member of the Second Ward High School class of 1966, told Hanchett in 2018.
The Second Ward High School football team practiced at the park. “All the people would come out and greet the players,” Hanchett said Manago told him. “The neighborhood would have cups of water for them, because it was in the summertime.”
And the school’s baseball team played its games there too, according to Hanchett’s research.
“Urban renewal demolished Brooklyn,” Hanchett wrote in his 2018 presentation. Such demolition projects occurred in Charlotte and elsewhere in the U.S. mainly in the 1960s.
County commissioners chair George Dunlap said once the community was destroyed, there was no one to go to the park. And the creation of Interstate 277 split it off from the rest of the community even further.
“The real damage had been done before the highway came through,” Dunlap said. “It wasn’t so much that it was in bad shape — but it was isolated.”
Desegregation of parks came slowly during the 1950s and 1960s, Hanchett said.
As redevelopment continued to encroach, Mecklenburg County commissioned landscape architect firm McAdams to develop a master plan several years ago to “re-activate” the park, according to the McAdams website.
The refurbished park includes multipurpose fields, sports courts, urban plaza areas, a comfort station, inclusive playground and walking paths.
Hanchett told The Charlotte Observer on Saturday he is delighted that the county has rejuvenated the park and its green space. “It has been an important part of our community since the 1940s,” he said.
‘It’s a blessing’
Under a clear blue sky, visitors to Pearl Park strolled onto the park’s new grassy lawn on Tuesday.
County commissioner Mark Jerrell said the expansion and revitalization of the park was something to applaud — and largely due to the the work of his predecessors.
“It’s never lost on me that we are only here as a direct result of the sacrifices that were made by so many before I even stepped foot in this role,” he said. “As I look out, and I see so many who have sacrificed for so many years, and it’s just an honor to be able to stand before you this morning.”
The $3 million project started in 2018. Through land swaps and partnerships with nearby organizations, the Mecklenburg County Parks and Recreation department was able to increase park space. In addition, a stream running through the park has been restored.
Now, it boasts a basketball court, pickleball courts, a playground, a public art installation, multi-use fields and an open-air pavilion.
Dunlap said the location of the park will make it a prime spot in Charlotte’s proposed “innovation district,” surrounding a future medical school. “And there’s so much more to come,” he said.
Pettis looked out at the park on Tuesday with pride, remembering his childhood afternoons there. He looks forward to bringing his grandchildren to show them where he grew up.
“It was really sad for somebody to take your whole community,” Pettis said. “We didn’t have anything left — nothing to bring your kids and grandkids back to. They took everything, and this park is the only thing we have left. We don’t have the houses and the churches or the community, but we can come here.
“It’s a blessing to still be alive to see this right now.”
This story was originally published December 14, 2021 at 1:41 PM.